i wish we talked more about the inclusion of intercultural skills and working with people who speak the dominant instutional language as a second-language. although most universities today are happy to have international students (or scholars) i find that often the introduction to the institution gets pushed to international students offices and to language courses. in reality, working in an environment where people come from diverse backgrounds requires certain skills that most of the time international students/scholars have to learn themselves. this learning is then usually in the form of assimilation to institutional cutlure rather than one of mutual learning and expansion. if all colleagues were more aware of what it means to come from a different language, communication, academic and cultural background, as well as the bureaurcracy and challenges that entails, e.g., visas, financial challenges, dietary issues, collaboration methods, and learned ways to use those differences to enrich the academic environment, we could enjoy the fruits of international scholar communities even more than we do today. (i hear that some of these problems are also common to academics of working class background, so maybe that would also be something to discuss). best, s. Message: 1 Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2010 15:57:24 -0800 From: Nancy Van House <vanhouse@ischool.berkeley.edu> To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: [Air-L] Re topics that don't get talked about (enough) Message-ID: <AANLkTinjDDiOSLMHJ8JPSYV-ZQ7BgsDR3amL9At0hdQL@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 This has been terrific -- lots of responses on and off the list. Keep 'em coming! Jst want to publicly thank all the people who've taken the time to respond. Some very thoughtful, heart-felt suggestions. Disclaimer: http://www.kuleuven.be/cwis/email_disclaimer.htm